


good to me

by takecourage



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Drinking, Feelings Realization, Fluff, M/M, general inability to get drunk without making things a little bit gay, jon sims is a total disaster, martin blackwood: pure of heart and home of sexual
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-28
Updated: 2020-10-28
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:22:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,775
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27247222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/takecourage/pseuds/takecourage
Summary: "It shouldn’t be something he notices, really, but once he sees it, he can’t stop seeing it."Or, the first time Jon properly looks at Martin.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist
Comments: 28
Kudos: 259
Collections: fABriC RusTLes - tma recs, tma fics, tma is an office comedy - tma fics (read)





	good to me

Jon isn’t drunk.

Well, not that drunk anyway.

He’s sat — _huddled_ might be more accurate — in a booth at the local Tim’s apparently been claiming as theirs for months now; he and Sasha long gone, like most of the people who were in the pub a few hours ago. Martin sits opposite him, still nursing the pint he’s had since half ten. The light and shadow and haze lingers on his skin, and Jon can’t stop looking at his hands, the way the his knuckles are brushed with gold, dipping into brief, shallow darkness and then stretching out lazily to gather at his wrists, complicated and simple all at once. The soft, golden glow of the lamps tousle through his hair, picking out strands in strawberry blond, drifting down to his eyes and Jon could stare into his eyes for hours, trying to name all those shades of brown.

It shouldn’t be something he notices, really, but once he sees it, he can’t stop seeing it.

Martin catches him staring, and coughs delicately. “You alright?”

Jon laughs half a laugh. “Yes. It’s, uh, been a while.”

“I can tell.” Martin smiles — no, _grins_ — his eyes glittering.

“Can you now,” Jon says, taking a sip of his pint, looking at him over the rim of the glass.

A blush colours Martin’s cheeks almost before he says it, his eyes darting to Jon’s lips, his throat, and the wall behind him. It’s not a bad look on him, actually — and it’s not like Martin’s never blushed in front of Jon before, it’s practically a daily occurrence, but this is the first time he’s properly looked. He needs to stop looking. He really needs to stop looking at Martin, at the way delicate pink spills across his cheeks, at his embarrassed half-smile and the way his eyes still glint despite it. Is this the first time he’s properly looked at Martin? That feels wrong. Well, not _wrong_ , and not immoral or illegal or whatever insane label his head is currently trying to put on it, more… daft. Not overtly stupid or idiotic, just a bit daft. Because, well, in this light, all soft and low, with the night lazily drifting past the windows and the low murmur of the pub all around them, Martin looks lovely.

Christ, maybe he is _that_ drunk. Which is actually borderline humiliating, considering he’s only four and half pints (and a few shots — thanks for that one, _Tim)_ down. He’s almost annoyed at himself — he used to be able to drink so much more in uni. Come to think of it, when was the last time he actually got drunk? Too long ago, clearly.

Too long ago, much like when this doomed-from-the-beginning night started. Once they all had a couple of drinks in them, it took the collective efforts of him and Martin to prise Tim and Sasha off each other long enough to actually talk to them for ten minutes. Then Tim got that look in his eye and Sasha started laughing at his jokes and they were off, practically joined at the hip. They make it look so easy, and Jon could feel Martin looking at him staring after them. He’s definitely had too much to drink and he’s starting to get a bit sad and everything’s confusing but—

But Martin. He’s got this kind of inherent goodness about him, and Jon, in equal parts, loves and hates it. The world is cruel and sharp and impossibly complicated, but Martin is straightforward, warm, and impossibly kind. Even though Jon’s been a right prick to him. It must seem cosmically unfair to Martin K Blackwood (what does the K stand for, anyway?) that he gets all this shit from Jon for being bad at his job when Jon himself is almost painfully under-qualified for his own. Not that Martin knows that. Or he does, and is just trying to be nice about it, make things just a tiny bit easier.

 _God,_ Jon thinks, _I am an_ arsehole _._

An arsehole who really, really needs to stop staring at Martin. He finishes the rest of his pint in a a too-big mouthful that tastes like dirt, mainly for something to do, but doesn’t look away from Martin. He’s being weird. He’s making it weird. He’s a weird, arsehole boss who knows when to stop but doesn’t. Now Martin’s looking at him staring, and yeah, he is far too drunk for this, and that blush creeps back in Martin’s cheeks and he looks, for want of a better word, lovely, and oh God, this is a fucking _nightmare_.

“It’s getting late,” Jon blurts eloquently, and immediately wants to kick the shit out of himself because _it’s getting late_ with literally no follow up _?_ What the _fuck_ , Jon?

“Um, yes?” Martin says, glancing around, his eyebrows furrowing together, and there’s this little crease right between them that sort of spreads a little way up his forehead and tapers off…

He needs to stop. Is he blushing now? Can Martin tell? “So we should, uh, probably go? Not, I mean, not _we_ we, not together, I’m not suggesting — but you? And also me?”

If Martin finds this outstanding display of idiocy annoying, he doesn’t show it. If anything, the blush intensifies, a small smile tugging at the corners of his lips. He’s got dimples, the one on the right much shallower (Jon’s right, Martin’s left, and now he’s thinking about how Martin sees it, how Martin sees himself, what the world looks like from Martin K Blackwood’s perspective, and what _does_ the K stand for, anyway?) than the one on the left.

Martin checks his phone, and winces slightly. “One for the road?” He says, his voice jokey but slightly strained, already half out of his seat.

“Why not.” It’s not exactly an intellectual answer, not funny or dryly witty or whatever it is Jon wants to be right now, but Martin seems content with it. He takes Jon’s glass in his other hand, and Jon almost resents him for it; he wanted to hear the abrasive clatter of glass against glass, have it jolt him out of whatever it is he’s feeling right now. Well, it’s not feeling so much as all these things he’s noticing, all of them new, and all of them should be unwelcome, but they’re not.

Martin’s hands, for one. Big and pale and soft, the faint blue lines of veins working their way under his skin, the short, straight scar stretching from his middle knuckle to an inch from his wrist, exposed by baggy jumper sleeves pushed back to the middle of his forearms, too-short shirt sleeves just peeking out. Jon, albeit a little distantly, imagines tracing all the lines and curves of Martin’s hands with his fingertips, and maybe Martin would complain about Jon’s permanently cold hands, maybe he wouldn’t say anything, and look at Jon’s hands on his, or at Jon’s face, all concentration and curiosity, or at the space in between. The thought is so intimate, so close, and such a Jon’s-had-one-too-many thing to think he instantly tries to push it down, but it comes back, it stays, soft and just warm enough to be comforting.

Yeah, too drunk.

That doesn’t stop him from hazily smiling when Martin comes back, two pints in hand, and sits opposite him. It shouldn’t send a little dizzy rush through him when he does — the man’s been sitting there all night, for Christ’s sake — but it does.

“When I was in uni,” Jon starts, ignoring the part of his brain screaming at him to _stop talking,_ “we used to go to this off-licence, New Zealand Wines, I think? Not relevant. Well, it is, kind of. Anyway, we’d all grab whatever we could afford, shove it all in to one bag, then kind of lucky dip it? We’d just close our eyes and grab something out, then drink it as fast as possible, make it a bit of a competition, then go to a proper pub.” The words come out of him in a rush, jamming and running over each other, and it’s really not that interesting, and he has no idea where the fuck it came from, but Martin is smiling — no, _grinning_ — again, and that cancels everything out, more or less.

“How much have you had?” He asks, still grinning.

“I think Tim spiked me.”

Martin laughs, and Jon’s smile is so big it hurts. “I wouldn’t put it past him.”

“Sasha probably put him up to it.”

“Oh yeah, she’s definitely the mastermind, like with everything.” He stops grinning abruptly, and Jon’s stomach drops. “Sorry! I, I didn’t mean like—”

Jon has no idea what he did or didn’t mean, and for once, isn’t bothered. “Martin.”

“Like at work? I’m not trying to say that she should’ve been—”

“Martin.”

“Because you’re doing a great job, I mean, really, the Archives look—”

“Martin.”

“Right, sorry, I was rambling, and I’m doing it again, _brilliant_ —”

“Martin! It’s fine.” He tries to put on his Head Archivist voice, but it just comes out giggly, which is incredibly embarrassing. At least Martin relaxes. “I honestly didn’t get… that. From what you just said, I mean.”

“Too pissed?” He asks, and the laugh is back in his voice, the blush back in his cheeks, spreading to the tips of his ears.

He tilts his glass towards Martin in a toast. “Something like that.”

Martin sat across from him, with his golden hair and uneven dimples and brown eyes and big hands, flushed and embarrassed but suddenly joking and confident; and maybe Martin K Blackwood isn’t as straightforward as he thought. And maybe he… likes that?

For fuck’s sake. _Too pissed_ indeed _._

“You know you were saying you used to drink whatever as fast as possible?” Martin says pensively, picking up his own glass. “Up for it again?"

Oh good, another opportunity to completely embarrass himself. “Bet I finish mine faster than you.” And he made it worse!

“Please,” Martin scoffs, rolling his eyes. “You?"

“What? I used to drink. I used to party.”

He groans. “I am begging you to never say _party_ again.”

“I did!” He says defensively, and a little, shitty plan starts forming in his mind. It could go one of two ways, and he’s hoping it’s the first so he doesn’t have to move countries.

“Just drink,” Martin says, his own glass mere inches from his mouth. “Three, two, one, go!”

Jon watches for a second, almost totally enraptured by the way his throat moves when he’s drinking, then says, perfectly casually, “I was in an emo band in uni.”

The effect is _spectacular_. Martin actually chokes, nearly dropping his pint in shock, beer spraying out his nose, and Jon is just swirling in giggles, laughing so hard he doesn’t make any sound, gripping the table for support, so hard he forgets he’s got a bet to win. He doesn’t really care, to be honest; he’s having fun for the first time in years.

“Jon, Jon, oh my God, what the _fuck?”_ Martin says, still catching his breath, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

Jon is now laughing so hard he’s got tears in his eyes, and Martin is starting to laugh as well, reluctantly and seemingly painfully, but laughing anyway.

“You cannot just drop that on me! I nearly died, Jon!”

He calms down just enough to stop laughing, then looks at Martin’s face and starts again.

“And you can’t just leave it there! I have _questions!”_

“Absolutely not,” he says, in between embarrassing little giggles that he can’t help. He really shouldn’t have said it. He’s never, ever going to hear the end of this. God, but the reaction was so funny — he almost wishes he had his tape recorder on him, so he could listen to it when he needed cheering up. Before Martin can say anything else, he says, “Weren’t we leaving?” He doesn’t mean to say _we,_ but it just sort of slips out. It sounds nice, anyway. Sort of intertwined, closeness implicit in it. He should stop, but he doesn’t want to. He’s going to regret this, once he’s sober. Back at work and back behind his desk where his Head Archivist voice doesn’t dissolve into giggles like he’s a teenage girl talking to a crush, and that is not a line of thought he wants to follow _at all,_ but does anyway, because although he knows when to stop, he doesn’t.

Martin K Blackwood, sat across from him with eyes that can’t be described as anything other than kind, beer down his front, blushing and he looks _lovely,_ just rolls his eyes and says, “finish your drink, you complete _shit.”_

And just like that, Jon falls.

Both metaphorically and literally, as it turns out — who knew London was full of invisible trip wires that have absolutely nothing to with the fact Jon hasn’t drunk this much since he was about twenty (again, embarrassing). He goes completely arse over tit as they leave the pub and Martin catches him before he hits the ground, entirely too smoothly, and rights him again.

“Alright there, Jon?”

Jon, not trusting himself to speak, just nods.

“Maybe I should walk you back, so you don’t end up falling in a ditch or something.” It’s a joke, surely, but there’s hesitancy in it. Martin’s looking at him, concerned and laughing all at once, and he wants to protest, to say he’ll be fine, he’s an adult, but the idea of shooting Martin down stings probably more than it should, so he just nods again. Smiles. It should be too much, but Martin smiles too, those dimples reappearing, and it’s not enough at all.

Martin ends up coming into his flat when he has slightly too much difficulty navigating the stairs. Normally, he would be embarrassed and awkward about it, but this night has been so _beyond_ weird and embarrassing and confusing he can’t find it in him to care. And it's been fun, too, which only makes things weirder.

He definitely says something incredibly stupid about his sofa, because Martin laughs again, but quietly, like he doesn’t want to be heard. Hopefully, when he wakes up, neither of them will remember. He lets himself be tucked into bed, which is equal parts humiliating and so unshakingly sweet Jon kind of wants to scream as Martin pulls the covers up around him. For once, they don’t feel like a shroud. They feel… safe (they feel safe and Jon feels cared for, adjacent to _loved;_ which, although not an entirely alien feeling, feels distant).

“There you go, Jon,” Martin says, his voice fond.

Jon wants to say thank you, say sorry, but it comes out as, “Martin?”

“Yeah?”

“What does the K stand for?”

“What?”

“Martin K Blackwood. What does the K stand for?”

“Oh. Right." he shifts around, a little awkwardly. "Nothing.”

“Knothing?” He wrinkles his nose. “That’s a weird name.”

“No, Jon, it—” he stifles a laugh. “Never mind.”

“ _Knothing_ ,” Jon mutters under his breath, utterly baffled.

“Sleep well.”

He hears Martin leave, closing the door quietly (and wishes he’d stayed).

Jon sits behind his desk, half a pack of paracetamol and, frankly, an irresponsible amount of water down, nursing a brutal hangover. He stares at the statement in front of him, the tape recorder quietly whirring by his left hand, but can’t bring himself to read it. He wants to curl up in a dark room and quietly pass away, which although seems like a bad move, feels right; there’s a bed in the backroom, for whatever reason, so he could. He’s not going to, but he could.

Martin comes into his office with a _knock knock!_ and a _morning, Jon_ , mug of tea in hand, and gently places it on Jon’s desk with a soft, hesitant smile, that (lovely) blush colouring his cheeks again. Jon sighs, trying and failing not to smile back. He needs to go back to his normal self, the typical arsehole boss, but he can’t face it. Not today, anyway.

God, it hasn’t stopped. He genuinely believed his head would sort itself out over night, and he wouldn’t still be _falling_.

Maybe falling is the wrong word, what with all the inevitability of hitting the ground inherent in it. It feels more like floating, like slowly drifting up away from cold concrete and towards something soft. Kind. All those shades of brown. He desperately wants to be annoyed, but he can't be.

“You’re… you’re very good to me, Martin.”

He just shrugs, says it’s nothing.

But, god, if it isn’t everything.

**Author's Note:**

> unbeta'd as ever but i hope you enjoyed!  
> if anyone needs me i'll listening to epiphany and pretending that's the world we live in <3


End file.
